I think HW Bush was one of the more recent Presidents who did have the skill set and experience needed to be an effective President. He seemed capable of making independent decisions without being overwhelmed or maneuvered by those close to him. His served in the military in actual combat, was a US Senator, was the US UN Ambassador, was head of the CIA, and spent 8 years as the VP. That is an impressive resume even if you did not agree with his brand of politics or decisions.

The problem is that the people with the skill set needed to be a good President never run or get anywhere near politics. Being a US President is a nightmare of a job. Non-stop 24/7 scrutiny and shrill demands from both foes and friends. Unrealistic expectations and never ending criticism over every decision or statement made. The most critical part of being a good President is choosing the right inner circle policy advisers. These advisers are selected with very little or no legislative review process and they are the ones the President relies on to provide the information need to make wise decisions. These advisers have an enormous amount of influence on the President. Obama has been poorly served by his advisers. He ended up with to many relatively inexperienced idealists who have made the President look hesitant and indecisive on just about every major decision made.

Please give an example of a country that is? And the EU (and a whole bunch of other countries)works hand in hand with the NSA collecting and sharing data. Why do you think the EU politicians stopped their vitriolic accusations in record time? Could it be that their own intelligence agencies pulled them aside and quietly told them they were cooperating with the NSA so shut the hell up? The naivety displayed by the people raging about the NSA in particular and America in general is breath taking. By failing to recognize that there are other very powerful and intrusive state security agencies involved in the mix makes any complaints are meaningless.

The prohibition on hollow point ammunition was declared in 1899. The US JAG office formally repudiated the prohibition and therefore hollow point ammunition is legally used by US military personnel. To even argue this point is silly in the extreme. In war bullets serve one purpose and that is to kill whoever you are shooting at. Getting shot in the head with hollow point ammunition is no different than getting shot in the head with non-hollow point ammunition.

I think reusable orbital entry vehicles, Mars landers, and the half a dozen other probes scattered on missions throughout the solar system might be something to brag about. Granted it's no warp drive or space elevator but show me any other space agency, private or public, domestic or global, that has did anything but but use the past 50 years worth of NASA R&D to accomplish anything worth bragging about.

Humans have been fighting and killing one another ever since there were enough people to pick sides. It most likely began with a cavemen wielding a club and waving a sharp piece of flint to get a nicer cave and better women. The fact we pretty much fight over the same reasons today leads one to wonder whether confrontation, aggression, and violence is built into human DNA. Are we just hardwired for aggression, confrontation, and violence? I suspect that without those built-in traits the human race would have never made it to the top of the food chain. Maybe one day the human race will channel these built-in traits into deep space manned exploration.

It would have been interesting if the drone was detected and they actually tried to shoot it down using the ground to air missile battery installed around the WH. Talk about massive overkill. They are going to end firing the rest of the current Secret Service agents who kept their jobs after the last security breach when someone actually made it into the WH. This drone serves as an excellent proof of concept and the next one might not be so benign.

Storing your stuff in China or Russian jurisdictions only raises you to the top of the governments shit list. On the other hand you can always join the US expat group in Russia. At least until Russia and the US agree to exchange certain individuals that may be resident in their countries. The US and Russia have a long history of making these kind of deals.

Spin my ass. I was there when Netscape had the largest browser marketshare and then gave it all away to became nothing more than a footnote in the history of the Internet browser evolution. It was right around the same time Java was a full fledged cluster fuck but I will leave that sad topic for another day. In the time it took to resurrect Netscape into Firefox and Firefox into Chrome MS had already grabbed 90%+ of the browser market. And Opera was hardly a competitor that could threaten MS dominance in any form or fashion. And as far as standards go when you have a 90% market share you are the standard. Even when you have "standards" the majority of website developers never follow or implement them correctly any way. Demanding some one adhere to standards is the same thing as demanding they stop trying to do new things not covered in the holy standards. And updating the standards is not a process that has ever happened quickly enough to keep up with the evolving web development platform. And re-read my earlier comment when I said MS still had a very healthy share of the INTRANET applications. Intranet applications allow a company or organization to pick their own standards when it comes to building their IT infrastructure. If an Intranet web application works in IE but has issues with Chrome who gives a shit when the company has determined IE as there Intranet standard? And of course the same thing happens in reverse if Chrome has been designated the company standard.

MS still holds a hefty market share for intranet web applications. And targeting multiple browsers, including IE, has become increasingly easier over the years for those who know what they are doing. And MS market share has declined because there are now other choices. It's easy to capture a +90% market share when there are no competitors. .

" many of us have heard " Define "us". Hearsay and fanboi forums are hardly the birth place of factual information. But judging from the rest of your comment you must already have full access to the MS source codebase. You sound almost smart enough to develop your own super secure rendering engine which is capable of maintaining at least a 1 year backwards compatibility window so your users are not forced to upgrade every 2 weeks to maintain a running system. Of course nobody has managed that particular feat quite yet but you sound smart enough to give it a shot.

I found your comment interesting since I work with industrial control systems used in refineries and pipeline operations. I work with the applications that interface with the HMI's, Plc's, and Omni flow control systems. I find the work very interesting and after designing and implementing software for 28 years that is saying something. So far the security aspects of the systems is being handled pretty well with all the network infrastructure buried behind firewalls and using VPN services to handle all the traffic. Could someone compromise the system from outside? I suppose anything is possible but in this case I don't see how that could be done easily. One thing that has struck me is how people talk about using software exploits to shutdown these types of operations when it would be much easier to physically attack the actual pipelines. While there is a security presence there is no way a 1000 mile pipeline can be constantly guarded. The Tank farms, booster stations, and operation facilities are well guarded but blowing up a pipeline would shutdown the operations. It's the same for people who drone on about the NSA or government collecting personal data. It would be much easier for the NSA to recruit insiders in companies like Google, MS, or CISCO. Low paid data center employees would be the place to start recruitment. An insider can keep an eye on things and be ready to help the NSA or any other intelligence service when needed. One good example of needing insiders to exploit a secure control system was the Stuxnet exploit that targeted Iran's centrifuges. The exploit would never have succeeded if the people behind the exploit did not have someone to walk in the Iranian operation center and insert a USB stick containing the exploit into a PC.

I can't remember the name but there was a film released a couple of years ago that was about the assassination of Bush.

Huh? Your response is a shocking example of idiocy in action.

Europe became pacifists and saved a lot of money at the same time because they knew the US had their back if they ever faced any serious threats. Without US military support Russia would have already reclaimed all the client states they lost when the USSR disintegrated and the Europeans could do nothing to stop Russia even if they wanted to..